The National Pension Commission (PenCom) has stated that newspaper organisations owe over N1.3 billion in unpaid pension contributions for journalists.
This was disclosed by the Director General of PenCom, Omolola Oloworaran, who led a delegation to the Nigerian Press Council in Abuja.
According to a statement from the Commission on Monday, Oloworaran expressed concerns over widespread non-compliance with the Pension Reform Act 2014 (PRA 2014) among media establishments.
Consequently, PenCom and the Nigerian Press Council have entered into a strategic collaboration to prevail on newspaper organisations to settle the huge pension liabilities owed to their employees.
The PRA 2014 mandates that employers remit monthly pension contributions into employees’ Retirement Savings Accounts (RSAs) no later than seven days after salary payments.
The PenCom DG said many media houses have failed to adhere to this requirement, prompting the Commission to assign Recovery Agents to audit and determine their outstanding pension debts and applicable penalties.
Recently, the PenCom DG has been leading an aggressive enforcement drive, building strategic partnerships with regulatory agencies aimed at recovering unpaid pension contributions from organisations running into billions of Naira.
